12 May HORIZON EUROPE: CLUSTER 5, CLIMATE, ENERGY AND MOBILITY

The new EU’s key funding programme HORIZON EUROPE has already started with a budget of 95.5 billion euros, and presenting various novelties respecting to the previous programme H2020: Missions, a more integrated and transversal Open Science concept, new partnerships, and the creation of the European Innovation Council (EIC). The programme will specially tackle the fight against climate change, through innovative projects that step up the digital and technological transition, while promoting European competitivity and growth during the 2021-2027 period.

HORIZON EUROPE is structured in three pillars: (1) Excellent science, (2) Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness, and (3) Innovative Europe. This Programme allocates a budget of 53.5 billion euros for pillar II, which is composed of 6 clusters:

• Cluster 1: Health
• Cluster 2: Culture, creativity and inclusive society
• Cluster 3: Civil security for society
• Cluster 4: Digital, industry and space
• Cluster 5: Climate, energy and mobility
• Cluster 6: Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, agriculture and environment

WHAT DOES CLUSTER 5 INCLUDE?

Cluster 5, which presents a budget of 15 469 million euros for the first calls during the years 2021-22, focuses on three research areas: (1) Climate Action, (2) Energy and (3) Transport. Cluster 5 has the general ambition to fight climate change by better understanding its causes, evolution, risks, impacts and opportunities. In addition, it is expected that the projects framed under Cluster 5 will contribute to the development of the energy and mobility industries without compromising planetary health, creating opportunities for more climate and environment-friendly, efficient, competitive, resilient, smarter, safer energy and mobility sectors, and having an equal impact in all EU citizens at the economic, social and territorial level.

Between 2021 and 2022, the already published work programme will specifically tackle the following intervention areas or destinations:

• Energy research and innovation, where 401 million € have been destinated to calls with deadlines on September/October 2022 and January 2023. including key research areas such as Bioenergy, Energy storage, Fusion energy, Geothermal energy, Hydropower, Nuclear fission, Ocean energy, Solar energy, Wind energy.
• Sustainable and smart transport and mobility, where 91 million € have been assigned to calls with deadlines on 6^th September, covering the following key research areas: Air transport research, Rail transport research, Road transport research, Waterborne transport research and Multimodal travel research.
• Climate action and adaptation to climate change, with 138 million € allocated to calls with deadlines on 6^th September 2022, including activities focused on climate science, polar and ocean research, climate resilience and adaptation to climate change, knowledge for climate neutrality, forest fires and extreme weather events, nature-based solutions, education on climate change, citizen engagement and behaviour change, and Biodiversity.

EXPERIENCE GAINED ON THE BASIS OF GOOD RESULTS

•  CARESTOR, a H2020-granted project of 2.7 million € for the “Market uptake of sustainable and competitive carbons for energy storage”.
• NaX2ceLL, a H2020-SMEInst-10-2016-2017 funded project of 50 thousand € for the development of an innovative software that simplify data exchange between different essential software for data processing and simulation modelling related to the Aerospace Industry.
• Recently, MAST3RBOOST project, a 6 million € proposal, has been awarded in the first edition of Horizon Europe calls (HE2021) for the “Maturing the production standards of ultraporous structures for high density hydrogen storage bank operating on swinging temperatures and low compression”.

CONTACTICA has created an exceptional network of partners at national and international level and the knowledge about suitable financing sources for each client. Our working method aims that our customers get the best results from their projects, minimizing investment through access to sources of direct funding (public financing). CONTACTICA provides a wide range of services for Research and Development projects. We accompany you throughout the entire proposal submission process, from the concept validation of the project, to the proposal writing and support in the submission process.

In addition, CONTACTICA offers project management, communication and dissemination and sustainability services for R&D projects, optimizing the project impact. The CONTACTICA‘s sustainability service provides added value to the projects guiding clients towards more environmentally, economically and socially responsible production processes and products along their entire life cycle. CONTACTICA has a dedicated department conducting economic and environmental feasibility studies (Life Cycle Analysis and Life Cycle Cost Assessments), applying eco-design and optimization tools and advising on the new EU Taxonomy regulation(see our post on the EU taxonomy – the environmentally sustainable activities classification system).